Senate OKs special provision preventing contingent fund transfer

MANILA, Philippines — The Senate has inserted a special provision in the approved 2024 budget that would prevent the use of contingent funds (CF) to augment the confidential and intelligence funds of agencies.

Sen. Sonny Angara confirmed to reporters that the Senate adopted the proposal of Sen. Risa Hontiveros to have a special provision prohibiting the use of CF for secret funds, following the controversial transfer of P125 million CF for Vice President Sara Duterte’s 2022 secret fund.

Duterte used P125 million of the P221.424 million CF her office received from the Office of the President to have confidential funds in 2022, even though her office does not have such a budget item that year.

Petitioners have questioned before the Supreme Court the constitutionality of the Office of the Vice President’s use of the contingent fund to fund a nonexistent fund, urging the Vice President to revert the P125 million confidential funds to the treasury.

Senate Minority Leader Koko Pimentel lauded the Senate’s adoption of the minority’s proposal.

The Senate will meet with its counterparts at the House of Representatives to convene the bicameral conference committee to thresh out the differing provisions of the budget bill, which the Senate passed on third and final reading on Tuesday.

The bicam will be held at the Manila Golf and Country Club in Makati today.

In the executive’s spending plan, the special provision on the P13 billion CF only states that it should be used to “cover the funding requirements of new or urgent activities or projects of national government agencies, GOCCs, and local government units that need to be implemented or paid during the year.”

The provision only states that the CF should not be used for the purchase and improvements of motor vehicles. The CF is a form of a special purpose fund, which is a lump sum allocation in the General Appropriations Act.